St Pancras Hotel

Details

Published on 31 August 2014

Hello,

Hope you've been having a lovely summer and are enjoying the prospect of September and the new beginnings it often heralds. For me July and August tend to be extremely busy and I rarely take a break. Clients are often away and it's a good time to get intrusive work done on their homes so I like to be around. If you follow me on Twitter you'll know that I enjoyed a long weekend off in July to celebrate a 'big birthday'. I did this in some style with a stay at the St. Pancras Hotel with my partner, David. Here is the photographic proof:

I wouldn't always choose a big hotel over a chic boutique one but I really wanted to see what they'd done with this hotel and I'd found it reassuringly friendly when I'd popped in for a quick drink a while ago. I thought I'd get lots of photos of great style statements but that was not to be and yet I wasn't disappointed. The furniture and furnishings are very much standard hotel fare and you barely notice them. What you do notice is the striking building. The hotel's website has many professional quality photos that show it off rather well so do check it out (link below). Here I'll share my snaps to give you a flavour of the areas you might be tempted to use.

The Booking Office Bar (above) manages to feel rather glamorous and cool but still casual. The bar and the furniture is grafted onto the original ticket office hall so the architectural detail and history is still all there to see through the dim lighting. A small gripe for me is that the oversized bland rectangular light shades hanging over the bar conceal some of the detail that it would be great to see.

The Gilbert Scott Bar (two images below), named after the hotel's original architect, is accessed directly off the street and felt slightly more serene than the Booking Office. We popped in for a nightcap after the theatre and a dinner out which felt terribly sophisticated, even though I plumped for a hot chocolate (no marshmallows, that would be childish).

I feared the hotel's Gilbert Scott Restaurant would be a bit stuffy and overpriced but it turned out to be friendly and on a par with any other nice London restaurant. We did roll our eyes a little when the guy from the couple at the next table, aged in their early twenties, asked to see the sommelier for the third time to show off his French and knowledge of wines - almost as entertaining as the lovely live piano music.

The corridor to the new part of the hotel is lined with life-sized images of people who could've staffed the hotel wayback when. I thought this fellow looked quite ghostly until I saw this snap of me standing next to him and realized that I actually look rather ghostly myself (pale and interesting?).

If you have a chance to stay at the hotel I can highly recommend it. Failing that you can still pop in and use the bars or the restaurant or even have tea and cake in the lobby. The staff are lovely and if you are taking the train from St Pancras, King's Cross or even Euston (10 minutes walk away) you'll find it a relaxing place to wait and unwind.

TRICIA CUNNINGHAMINTERIORS

Tricia Cunningham Interiors creating beautiful and individual homes in Manchester and Cheshire. Working mostly in Hale, Bowdon, Altrincham and Didsbury with clients who want an interior designer who will help them create a home they’ll love to live in.

0161 445 2795/07773 462 261
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.